Stipe Mesić, byname of Stjepan Mesić (born Dec. 24, 1934, Orahovica, Croatia, Kingdom of Yugoslavia) Croatian politician who served as president of Croatia (2000–10).

Mesić earned a degree in law from the University of Zagreb (1961), after which he returned to his hometown of Orahovica in eastern Croatia, which was then part of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, and served as mayor. In 1971, however, the Yugoslav communist authorities jailed him as a counterrevolutionary for supporting the “Croatian Spring,” a liberal nationalist awakening. He spent a year in the harsh Croatian Stara Gradiska political prison camp. Afterward, as a political outcast, Mesić focused his energies on serving as general manager of a small architectural firm in Zagreb.

In 1989 Mesić again became active in opposition politics, joining Franjo Tudjman and other antiregime dissidents, and became secretary of the new pro-independence and nationalist Croatian Democratic Union (Hrvatska Demokratska Zajednica; HDZ), which won power the following year. Mesić was appointed president of the new government and represented Croatia at the federal Yugoslav level, having the distinction of serving as the last president of the large Yugoslav Federation. He resigned on Dec. 5, 1991, following attacks on Croatia by the Serb-dominated Yugoslav armed forces. Upon the creation of an independent Croatian state, Mesić became president of the parliament; Tudjman was elected president of Croatia.

By 1994 Mesić had broken with the HDZ over Tudjman’s autocratic rule. Thus, he began another period of political wandering. He failed in an attempt to forge a new party among HDZ dissidents, and in 1997 he joined the small Croatian National Party (Hrvatska Narodna Stranka; HNS) and soon became its vice president. In 1999 the HNS joined other opposition parties to contest parliamentary elections that resulted in the HDZ’s defeat. In late 1999 Tudjman died, and in the presidential elections of 2000 Mesić’s folksy and populist campaign, as well as his well-honed political instincts, struck a chord with an electorate tired of government corruption and abuse of authority. Mesić won in a runoff, and he was sworn in as president on Feb. 18, 2000.

Facing a fractious six-party coalition government, Mesić promised to reduce the powers of the presidency, scale back the intelligence services, reform a corrupt privatization process, restore friendly ties with Croatia’s neighbours, and integrate Croatia into NATO and European institutions. In 2003 he visited Serbia and Montenegro, which marked the first presidential visit between the former warring countries. Mesić was easily reelected president in 2005. Government corruption slowed Croatia’s attempt to join the European Union, and in 2006 Mesić led renewed efforts to combat malfeasance. In 2009 he oversaw Croatia’s entrance into the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). At the end of his second term in February 2010, Mesić was succeeded as president by Ivo Josipović, a member of the opposition Social Democratic Party of Croatia (Socijaldemokratska partija Hrvatske; SDP).

Stipe Mesić (right) with U.S. Pres. George W. Bush, 2008.

Eric Draper/The White House

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Tudjman died in December 1999, and Stipe Mesić, who had broken with the HDZ over Tudjman’s autocratic rule, was elected president in February 2000. Mesić quickly moved to cut down corruption and to improve Croatia’s relations with its neighbours, but he failed to deliver on promises of early entry to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) or the European Union (EU). Croatia...